West Virginia lawmakers warn subpoenas possible if Flock fails to provide requested data

Our Take

Credit to WCHS-TV for tracking this one closely, because it's a rare sight: elected officials actually pushing back on a surveillance vendor instead of rubber-stamping another camera contract. Del. Tristan Leavitt's distinction cuts right to the heart of the problem — Flock loves to tout that its "central cloud environment" has never been breached, but that's a carefully worded answer to a question nobody asked. The real question is whether the cameras bolted to poles across West Virginia, quietly photographing every plate that passes, can be hacked, spoofed, or accessed without authorization at the edge, before data ever reaches that cloud.

This is exactly the kind of scrutiny ALPR networks have evaded for years. Companies like Flock get to set the terms of the conversation, answer the softball version of the question, and call it transparency. Lawmakers asking about false hot-list alerts and employee access to customer data are asking what communities should have asked before signing these contracts in the first place: who can see this data, how accurate is it, and what happens when the system gets it wrong and flags an innocent driver as a wanted felon.

If Charleston has to subpoena a surveillance contractor just to get straight answers about its own hardware, that tells you everything about how little oversight exists once these cameras go up. Check our map to see what's already watching your plates, and hit up take action if you want your own lawmakers asking these same hard questions.